Six amazing features which makes WordPress 4.6 highly user friendly

WordPress 4.6 has hit the blogosphere with a gigantic thud. Bloggers and developers are just awakening to its potential. WordPress has lived up to its tradition of naming every update after jazz musicians. This time round, the new update is honouring Jazz legend Frederick “Pepper” Adams III. For those of you who are not familiar with his work, here is a video of the maestro himself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5jQMY4dbU4WordPress 4.6 Pepper was released thanks to the hard work of 272 coders from around the world who did a wonderful job in turning things around. Check out the official video intro here:

WordPress 4.6 is available in 50 languages as of now. So what is new? Let us find out:1. Native Fonts

This is probably the most obvious change you will notice when you update to “Pepper”. Your admin board will be using native fonts used by the UI of your operating system. This change positively affects the loading speed. WordPress used to use Open Sans from Version 3.8. During those times it made sense to have a default font across all devices. But since then, there has been a sea change of technology such that it doesn’t make much sense to continue with the same.2. Shiny Updates

The process of updating and installing plugins has been revamped. Things are much easier from the user’s perspective. While installing or updating a plugin, you remain in the same page as opposed to the earlier versions where the user is forced to leave the admin area. This feature is powered by AJAX.A powerful search panel has also been added, again with the help of AJAX. Plugins can be found instantly just by typing into the search box. 3. Import ScreenPepper makes WordPress seem easier for someone who has just started using it. The import screen is one area where a newbie will be spending a lot of time Installing and running an importer has been made easier. The accessibility of options and screens have also been improved. The developers couldn’t have made it more user friendly!Improvements made in the EditorWordPress 4.6 features 3 changes in the Editor section which makes it way more user friendly when compared to the previous versions. 1. No more broken links!This is one of the handiest feature in the update. Pepper comes with an inline broken link checker. That is, in case you add a broken link in the editor, it will be highlighted as a spelling mistake instantly. Users can save a lot of time thanks to this new feature as they do not have to manually go to each link and check if its broken or not.2. New and improved Content RecoveryEven previous versions of WordPress used to save your content in case there was an issue with the internet connection. WordPress 4.6 is much more intuitive in this sense. The process of recovery has been made easier and much more reliable. Pepper does the job by saving the content locally in your browser. If there is a connection error, a notice will pop up saying that the version below is different from the backup of the post saved in the browser. You will also see a button to restore the backup version.

3. Emoji Updates

Now you can use all the latest emoji characters. WordPress 4.6 has updated emoji version to Unicode version 9.0. Final ThoughtsThe keyword here is “User Experience”. Pepper makes it super easy to navigate especially for a newbie. The editor has become more powerful. WordPress 4.6 features much more than this from the perspective of a developer. If you are into developing, check out our special blog post just for you!